


Bitter

by shieldings



Series: We'd Fly Away Together [1]
Category: Teen Titans (Animated Series), Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Awkward Kissing, Everyone is miserable, Extremely Dubious Consent, F/M, Mental Health Issues, apprentice au, not between the main pair but
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-16
Updated: 2016-06-16
Packaged: 2018-07-15 11:11:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7220047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shieldings/pseuds/shieldings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He has distant memories of fighting being fun, an intricate dance of escrima sticks and acrobat's reflexes.  Now, it's pure function, all focused blows and sharp edges.  He has distant memories of a hand on his shoulder that was there to encourage him, instead of restrain him.</p><p>But there is no girl in his memories, no girl with crooked teeth and battle scars.  Tara is not the equivalent of anything or anyone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bitter

**Author's Note:**

> Here is something Terrible  
> This is kind of a fusion between the comic and animated universes. Dick and Tara are both Slade's apprentices. Dick's apprenticeship came about the way it did in the cartoon, and Tara's the way it did in the comics (ie, she was essentially a merc beforehand). Tara on the whole is much closer to her comics incarnation than she is in my other garbage fic. She does a lot of lying and moral dissonance bc that's what comic Tara does. Somebody stop my daughter  
> Anyway they both Suffer and neither of them really has any idea what's going on

“Do you think... do you think this makes us adults?” She swings her feet from the top bunk, narrowly missing his face.

 

“Of course not.” He focuses on wrapping up the ugly wound on his left arm.

 

“We fight adults. I've killed them.” The bed creaks as she leans back. It's an ugly sound.

 

“Killing doesn't get you anywhere,” he says. He wonders how many times he's said it before; it's become repeated words to him, like a prayer.

 

“You just say that because _he_ told you to say it.”

 

“He taught me well.”

 

They sit in silence for a while. He can hear her drumming her fingers against her bare thigh above him.

 

“What was he like?” she asks. “I've seen him-- I've seen you both on TV before. You act totally different from how I thought you'd be. Is he different, too?”

 

“He worries a lot.”

 

“More than you?” She hangs her head down to face him. Her eyes dart across his bloody arm. “Hey, d'you think that will get infected?”

 

“If it does, it does.”

 

“How did he treat you? Did he hit you a lot?”

 

“Once or twice.” He cuts the bandage. “Mind control.”

 

“So not when you screwed up or anything.” She contemplates for a moment, before smiling widely. “Must have never gotten anything done.”

 

“That's not funny.”

 

“You were a lot cuter on TV, Dick.”

 

“You were a lot cuter before you tried to kill my friends.”

 

“Just doing my job, Birdboy.”

–

When he was very small, Bruce had warned him that not everybody who smiled could be trusted. He reminded himself of this when he saw her.

 

Every day, the rock in his stomach told him that he was going to fail everybody. It told him that he was no longer special, no longer fit to protect anyone.

–

“Hey, Tara.” He opens the door with his eyes closed, as always. A few months ago she walked in on him getting dressed, and he doesn't want to return the favor.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“You left your hairpin in the training room.”

 

“Thanks.” She takes it; her hand is warm and calloused. “You can open your eyes, you know.”

–

She's the one who kisses him; it's late at night, and he's doodling on the wall with a burnt stick. She wraps her bony arms around his shoulders from behind and squeezes him, almost painfully hard.

 

“Are you okay?” he asks.

 

“Better than ever,” she says.

 

He squirms around to face her. He furrows his eyebrows. “You look exhausted,” he says.

 

There's a moment where they just stare at each other, blue against blue. Then she leans forward and kisses him furiously, holding onto him as if she's drowning. It's an ugly kiss; it tastes like tears and crooked teeth.

 

He pulls back, stumbles out of her frantic grip.

 

“What are you _doing?_ ” he whispers, even though nobody is there to see them (he's checked every possible place a camera could be hidden, and they're all clean).

 

“I wanted to,” she says, not meeting his eye.

 

“You shouldn't kiss people without asking.”

 

“Had to get a gross taste out of my mouth.”

–

When he spars with her, his heart probably pounds harder than it should.

 

He knows what it's like to have a crush; when he was nine years old, he told Bruce he was going to marry Wally. When he was eleven, it was Barbara, and he followed Roy like a puppy throughout middle school.

 

This is different. He decides it probably has something to do with the situation; after all, Tara is the only other person in the world who's experiencing something so close to what he is. Of course, she's here of her own free will. She's hurt his friends, and she's a happy follower of his worst enemy. If he didn't spend so much time with her, he probably would have written her off as just another teenage sociopath hell-bent on destruction.

 

He knows that there's more to her when he speaks to her at night. That's when she's too tired to filter her speech. Her unguarded words are dripping with insecurity and self-loathing, and something in him wants to _heal_ her. He knows that people don't work like that, but he still fantasizes about seeing a genuine smile on her face: one that isn't a mask.

–

“Ever fucked anyone?” she asks, completely straight-faced.

 

His mouth hangs open for a second before he shakes his head. “Never got that far.” He hesitates. “I made out with someone, though.”

 

“Nice.” She goes back to balancing pebbles on her fingertips.

–

He'd sworn to his second father that he'd never hurt anybody innocent. He tells himself that he's keeping his promise, even as he presses his blade to the throat of the shaking man before him.

 

This is his first contract: he's been sent to neutralize the leader of a human trafficking ring. He knows that it's just so somebody else can elbow his way in on the profit, but he tells himself that he's ridding the world of somebody dangerous.

 

 

“I-- I can pay you,” the man stutters. A drop of red bubbles at his throat as he speaks. “Anything you want.”

 

Dick remains silent, tells himself that he's dreaming. Once he's reached his goal, he'll wake up in his room at the manor. Alfred will scold him for sleeping in but bring him a cup of tea anyway. The wind will whistle through the crack in his window, and the wood floor will be cool against his feet, and--

 

“Anything you want,” the man repeats, leaning into the wall to ease the pressure on his throat. “It doesn't have to be money, I could find you connections, I could--”

 

He dies unimpressively, bleeds out on the concrete. Dick's knife clatters to the ground.

 

When he wakes up the next morning, it's to Tara staring at him as though he's some exotic animal.

–

“Does it always feel like that?” he asks.

 

“What?”

 

“Killing someone.” He stares at his fingernails. There's not a trace of blood left under them, but they have the wrong texture, maybe.

 

“Oh,” she says. If he didn't know better, he'd think she sounded relieved.

 

“I'd thought it would feel... worse,” he says.

 

“Wait, you _liked_ it?”

 

“No. It's just that.... killing that guy didn't actually feel like anything. He was there, and then he wasn't.”

 

She snorts. “Did you think you'd feel his soul flying out or something?”

 

“I-- maybe, I don't know.”

 

“It's like fishing.” She flashes that dishonest smile at him. “It's terrible if you think about it too much, but it's not bad if you ignore the gross parts.”

 

“Fishing,” he whispered to himself.

–

He doesn't really know what he'd expected; he should have figured it out a long time ago. He's still shocked when he sees them together.

 

It's a grotesque tangle of two bodies: a large hand on a thigh, a pair of thin clinging arms, yellow hair splayed across the ground like a dark parody of a halo. They don't notice him.

 

He backs out of the room, his gut churning.

–

“You're not really yourself around them, are you?” Roy asked one sunny Wednesday. “I haven't heard a single pun since I arrived here.

 

“I need to be a leader,” Dick said. “I can't afford to goof around.”

 

“You're creeping me out.” Roy twisted a trick arrow in his hand. “It's like you're not even the same person.”

 

“I think that's just called growing up.”

–

He can't meet her eye when she returns to their room.

 

“I had an idea,” she says. “I had an idea about what you and me are.”

 

He doesn't say anything. He doesn't trust himself not to say something awful.

 

“I think we're a hobby.” She clambers up onto her bunk. “I think we're something he works on when he's bored.”

 

“Stupid hobby,” Dick says. He can't think of anything else.

 

“I guess.” She begins to fidget with her hair, teasing out knots with her long fingers.

 

He can't sleep that night.

–

His second contract is easier, because he knows what to expect. The man he's after is from a Falcone branch family, in California on vacation.

 

“Kid, kid, you don't know what you're doing,” he says.

 

Dick is silent. He stares just over the man's shoulder as he slits his throat.

–

He has distant memories of fighting being fun, an intricate dance of escrima sticks and acrobat's reflexes. Now, it's pure function, all focused blows and sharp edges. He has distant memories of a hand on his shoulder that was there to encourage him, instead of restrain him.

 

But there is no girl in his memories, no girl with crooked teeth and battle scars. Tara is not the equivalent of anything or anyone.

–

She kisses him again, late at night. This time it's softly, on the forehead. She thinks he's asleep. He doesn't tell her he isn't. She leaves the room, humming to herself. He knows where she's going.

–

“What do you think would happen if we killed ourselves?” she asks.

 

“Why would you say something like that?”

 

“He'd get so mad, but he wouldn't be able to do anything about it.” She's almost laughing, but not quite. “Maybe he'd take it out on Wintergreen.”

 

“Maybe he'd take it out on my friends.”

 

“They haven't come to rescue you.”

 

“They tried, at first.”

 

“I'm glad they failed.”

 

He pauses for a second. “I am too, I guess.”

–

They take a contract together. This target is heavily guarded, and Dick doesn't know what he does. Tara's eyes are like ice, and her posture is like a coiled snake's. When she walks, he can see the concrete rippling behind her.

 

She's grown so much since her apprenticeship started: she can whittle a loose brick until it's pencil-thin,and send it flying straight through the heads of three men in a row. Dick still struggles to fight with lethal intent.

 

The target is neutralized minutes after their arrival. Not a single shot has been fired.

 

Tara looks proud of herself. Dick grabs her hand, and she doesn't slap his away.

–

“I know what you're doing,” he says at last. “I know what you're doing with Slade.”

 

She starts. “No, you don't.”

 

“I saw you,” he says. “I saw you two months ago.” His hands are shaking.

 

“It's not how you think it is.” She slumps against the wall. “It's just something we do.”

 

“I... I don't get it.”

  
“I came onto him, if that's what you're wondering.” She stretches luxuriously. “I could tell he was into me, so I asked him if he wanted to screw, and he was up for it. Why do you care, anyway?”

 

“I'm worried about you,” he admits, joining her on the floor.

 

“Weird,” she says.

–

They end up kissing again, in the training room. He's showing her how to use a staff (in case her powers are ever disabled), and she's finally getting the hang of it when she trips over her oversized adolescent feet and knocks them both over.

 

Her hair hangs like a curtain over his face. She stares at him. He stares at her. It's like a romcom with more bruises and bitter feelings.

 

He leans up and kisses her half-open mouth. She responds enthusiastically, clutching the fabric of his shirt in one hand. It's a mess of bumping noses and small sighs.

 

“I love you,” he whispers, so quietly that it's almost a thought.

 

“Holy shit,” she whispers, not quite so quietly.

–

She comes back to the room with a hickey on her collarbone that hadn't been there before.

 

“Is it scary?” he asks. He feels stupid just saying it.

 

“Nope. Used to it.”

 

“Do you think he knows?”

 

“Probably. One of us is gonna die.” She laughs and climbs onto her bunk.

 

He hates himself for it, but he can't get the image of her pale hands clutching at another person's back out of his mind.

–

“Stop,” Tara says in her sleep. “Leave me alone,” she says.

 

Dick doesn't know what she's afraid of; she claims that she never remembers her dreams. He knows that she keeps her distance from him in the mornings, stands like a beaten dog and smiles nervously.

–

When she's on contract, she's beautiful and terrifying.

  
Dick wonders when he stopped seeing his targets as people.

 

She kisses him on the corner of the mouth before going in for the kill. He thinks he sees apprehension in her eyes, but he isn't sure.

–

The JLA interferes, months too late.

 

Apparently, Batman doesn't appreciate people kidnapping his children.

 

Tara makes a run for it as soon as there's an opening. Dick isn't really sure what he'd expected to happen. She isn't exactly League material. He isn't either, at this point.

 

“None of this is your fault,” somebody says as he looks desperately from side to side, hoping to see a ripple of disturbed stone or a flash of blond hair.

–

His heart hurts when the ground shakes. For years, California earthquakes bring back memories of warm stone and fake smiles. Nobody knows why he doesn't run for shelter when the alerts pop up on the TV. They wonder if he has a death wish.

 

The truth is, he's just wondering if she's back.

 

**Author's Note:**

> whoops now it's time for me to work on less self-indulgent bullshit  
> (in other news i suuuuuck)


End file.
